Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/583

Rh PTOLEMAEUS. cular, the catalogue of stars. It was reprinted (Lalande) Basle, 1543, folio ; Nuremberg, 1550, folio ; and, apparently in the same year, another title was put to it (Halma, preface, p. xliii.). The first complete edition is the Latin version of Peter Liechtenstein, "Almagestum Claudii Ptolemei, Pheludiensis Alexandrini . . . .," Venice, 1515, folio (Lalande and Baily). It is scarce, but there is a copy in the Royal Society's library. Baily says that it bears internal marks of having been made from the Arabic (as was indeed generally admitted), and throws great light on the subsequent Greek editions and versions. Next comes the version of George of Trebizond, " Ptolemaei Almagestum, ex Versione Latina Georgii Trapezuntii," Venice, 1525, folio. (Fabricius, who is in doubt as to whether it were not 1527, and confounds it with the former version.) From all we can collect, however, no one asserts himself to have seen an earlier edition of the version of Tpapezuntius than that of Venice, 1528, folio (with a red lily in the title page) ; and Hoffman sets down none earlier. Its title (from a copy before us) is " Claudii Pto- lemaei Pheludiensis Alexandrini Almagestum.... latina donatum lingua ab Georgio Trapezuntio.... anno salutis mdxxviii. labente." This version is stated in the preface to have been made from the Greek*: the editor was Lucas Gauricus. The nine books of astronomy by the Arab Geber, edited by Peter Apian, Nuremberg, 1534, folio, and often set down as a commentary on, almost an edition of, the Almagest, have no right whatever to either name, as we say from examination. Halma, ob- serving in the epitome of Purbach and Regiomon- tanus strong marks of Arabic origin, and taking Geber to be in fact Ptolemy, concludes that the epitome was made from Geber, and reproves them for not naming their original. Halma must have taken Geber's work to be actually the Almagest, for, with the above censure, he admits that the two epitomists have caught the meaning and spirit of Ptolemy. It is worth while, therefore, to state, from examination of Geber (whom Halma had not seen), and comparison of it with the epitome in question, that neither is Geber a commentary on the Almagest, nor the epitome formed from Geber. The first Greek text of the Almagest (as well as that of Euclid) was published by Symon Grynoeus, Basle, 1538, folio : " K. UroKe/xaiov tx^ydk'qs avv- Ta^eois jStgA. ly' ... ." It is Greek only, and con- tains the Almagest, and the commentary of Theon [Pappus]. Basle, 1541, folio. Jerome Gemusaeus published " . ... omnia quae extant opera (Geogra- how small an error is not worth correcting when great names support it. Halma, followed by Baily, says that Trapezuntius got his Greek manuscript from a copy of one in the Vatican, made- by order of the abbot Bartolini. But what Gauricus says is " Georg. Trap, magnum hunc Astronomura .. . . e Graeca in Latinam transtulit iinguam. Quem Lau- rentius Bartolinus . . . . e Vaticano exemplar!. ... transcribendum curavit." The quem seems to refer to Trapezuntius, who had long been dead : Gauricus explains how he came by a copy. Andrew Trapezuntius, in his preface to his father's work (which follows that of Gauricus), though dedicating to the pope, does not hint at the manuscript from the pope's library, nor at any manuscript in par- ticular. PTOLEMAEUS. 571 phia excepta) " This edition contains the Almagest, Tetrabiblon, Centiloquiunit and Inerrarh. Hum Stellarum Significationes of Ptolemy, and the Hypotyposes of Proclus. Except as containing the first professed collection of the works, it is not of note. As to its Almagest, it is Trapezuntius as given by Gauricus. The publisher, H. Petnis, seems to have found reason t to know that he had been mistaken in his editor. In 1551 (Basle, folio) he republished it as " . . . . omnia quae extant opera, praeter Geographiam, quam non dissimili forma [double column] nuperrime agdidimus : summa cura et diligentia castigata ab Erasmo Oswaldo Schrek- henfuchsio . . . . " The contents are the same as in the former edition, with notes added by the new editor. Emsmus Reinbold published the first book only (Gr, Lat. with Scholia), Wittenberg, 1549, 8vo. (Lalande, who gives also 1560), and also 1569 (Halma). S. Gracilis (Legrele) piib- blished the second book in Latin, Paris, 1556, 8vo. (LaL Halm.). J. B. Porta gave the first book in Latin, with Theon, Naples, 1588, 4to. (Lai.), and the first and second books in the same way, Naples, 1605, 4 to. (Lai. Halm.). From the time of Galileo, at which we are now arrived, we cannot find that any complete version of the Almagest (Greek edition there certainly was none) was published until that of Halma, to which we now come. We shall not attempt to describe the dissertations by Delambre, Ideler, &c., con- tained in this splendid collection, but shall simply note the contents of the first four volumes : for the rest see Theon. Of the manuscripts we have already spoken. The descriptions are — Paris, 1813, 1816, 1819, 1820, quarto. The first two volumes contain the Almagest, in Greek and French, with the various readings. The third contains the Kavdov ^a<riei(av and the (pdffeis twu diravwu of Ptolemy, and the works of Geminus. The fourth contains the viro64(J'€t.5 twv TrXauwixivwv and the dpxo^ xal viTodecreis /xadrjixaTiKal of Ptolemy, and the vitotu- TTwcrets of Proclus. The part of the Almagest which really concerns the modern astronomer, as part of the effective records of his science, is the catalogue of stars in the seventh and eighth books. Of this catalogue there have been several distinct editions. The earliest (according to Lalande, not mentioned by Halma) is a Latin version by John Noviomagus, from Trapezuntius, " . . . . Phaenomena stellarum 1022 fixarum ad hanc aetatem reducta ," Co- logne, 1537, folio, with forty-eight drawings of the constellations by Albert Durer. The next (Baily) is a Greek edition (stated to be furnished by Halley), at the end of the third of the four volumes of Hudson's " Geographiae veteris Scriptores Graeci minores," Oxford, 1698—1712, 8vo. The next (Halma) is a French version by Montignot, Nancy, 1786, and Strasburg, 1787, 4to., translated into German by Bode, Berlin and Stettin, 1795, 8vo. The last, and by far the best, is that given (in Greek) by the late Francis Baily, in his collection of the catalogues of Ptolemy, Ulugh Beigh, Tycho Brahe, Halley, and Hevelius, which forms volume xiii. of the Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society, London, 1843, 4to. This edition of the t Mr. Baily, who closely examined all his edi- tions, as will presently be noted, does not evea give the name of this one, though to our know ledge it was one of those he tried to make use of.
 * It is a slight matter, but it is difficult to say